Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans
by Jessa L'Rynn
Summary: Rose found it in a small used book store and, with effort, brought it home. Her acquisition has repercussions.
1. Chapter 1

Written for the Storm and Wolf ficathon over on Live Journal. My prompt was Prompt 13: Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans. I could NOT resist...

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**Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans**

_**or**_

**Rose's Shopping Trip and What Became of What She Found There**

_Chapter 1_

Rose found it in an extremely cluttered used book shop on Gyseppi Enoya, where they were scheduled to spend several days. It was pretty, she supposed, in a book sort of way, but no prettier than any of the other leather-bound, brightly displayed novels around it. The color of the book wasn't particularly interesting, nor were there beautiful pictures on the cover designed to catch the eye and inspire the imagination. It was just a small, decorative pattern of silver leaves against a dark scarlet background. All in all, it was quite ordinary as books went, so Rose had to study it for a long moment before she realized why this book, in particular, leapt out at her from all the books she could see stacked on every available surface in the shop.

It came to her in a flash and she decided that she wasn't getting stupid, just getting used to it. The ornate geometric circles on the cover were utterly familiar to her, being that they could be found all over the TARDIS, and the TARDIS was her home. Highly stylized and one of them even resembling some kind of royal seal, Rose had probably seen every last one of them before.

They were the Doctor's nearly lost language. Against all odds and as impossible as it seemed, this book absolutely had to be from the Doctor's destroyed home planet. Rose snatched it up like a miracle and cuddled it to her breast like a lost child. Not even bothering to open it, she carried her precious find to the desk. Forget the trashy romances she'd come to browse through, this was a million million times more important. Prepared to barter everything short of her immortal soul, Rose went to the shop keeper to try to strike a bargain.

* * *

When she reached the TARDIS, Rose was ecstatic. She was also missing her trainers, her hair clips, and two hours of her life that she could never get back. However, between all those things (the last spent working the till in the bookshop while the assistants ran off together into the back room), Rose had gotten the book and even had it gift-wrapped. She doubted the Doctor had even noticed she'd been gone.

They'd been here for three days now while the Doctor tinkered endlessly with something that had been playing him up and that this planet was ideal to test. Rose had gone out on her own every day, but with the insistence that she take her mobile and some psychic paper. Just because he wouldn't notice if she was lost didn't mean he didn't want to be able to find her.

"What happened to you?" the Doctor demanded and apparently he not only noticed she'd been out, he'd also noticed her... um. New look. His blue eyes whipped over her body, probably inspecting for dirt or injuries. He looked ready to sweep her up and drag her off to the med bay.

"It's not what it looks like," Rose explained. "I had to trade for some books."

"But your shoes?" the Doctor insisted.

"She wanted my earrings," Rose shot back. "I wasn't giving her them, so it was my trainers and hairclips instead."

The Doctor frowned thoughtfully and Rose told herself not to pay attention to the fact that that expression set bits of her tingling for no readily apparent reason. She was just overly sensitive to his moods, that was all. Plus, she'd done this for him and he didn't need to be all grumpy about it before he knew.

"Did you really need a pan-galactic Mills and Boone novel that much?" The Doctor huffed and tsked and turned back to playing with the console. "Gave you money, I thought. You already spend it?"

"Was a bit more important," Rose assured him. "An' I coulda used your card for Mills and Boone, wouldn'ta felt the slightest bit guilty."

"What'd you buy?" the Doctor wanted to know, and there was an absolutely evil little grin on his face when he turned from the console to look at her. "Was it something terribly inappropriate that you think I'll lecture you about?"

"What _could_ you lecture me about?" Rose asked, cheerfully. "Been through your library, remember. You got everything in there from medical books in the recipe section to The Anarchists How-To to Chinese Water Torture for Dummies. No way you'd ever get the right to lecture me on what's s'posed to be in a book or not."

"There's nothin' wrong with havin' informative texts around in case you need 'em," the Doctor said cheerfully.

"You likely to... never mind, I was about to ask if you were likely to blow something up, and that's like 'are you likely to land us right in the middle of a disaster' or 'are you likely to walk into my room when I'm half-naked', I mean..."

"I've never done that!" the Doctor interrupted, and his eyes absolutely danced. "I'm sure I'd remember," he added, looking her over in a quick but suggestively flirtatious way that had Rose wanting to giggle like a teenager.

Instead, she resorted to her usual: counter-flirt and up the ante. "Bad timing, Doctor? From you?" She leaned forward just a bit to see whether he would jump away or maybe lean closer. They walked such a very fine line, the two of them, after all. "You'll have to try -" deep breath, arch the spine just a little - "harder." She glanced quickly downward, trying to look like she was pretending nonchalance. Surely he knew what her gaze was meant to be flitting past.

The Doctor chuckled wickedly, leaning back against the console, apparently to make sure she had a complete and thorough view of what she was trying to steal peeks at. "Did I hear an invitation there?" he murmured.

Rose squeaked and realized she'd definitely lost this round. "Tea in the library?" she offered. "I'll change and make it while you get cleaned up."

The Doctor smirked for a second with triumph, but then he seemed to consider what she said because he looked over his clothes with consternation. "I'll change me jumper," he offered hesitantly.

Rose beamed. "Well, it's not like our teas are black tie, anyway. I was more thinking of the black streak on your nose."

Snickering, she left the Doctor in the console room, trying to cross his eyes well enough to see the end of his aquiline nose. Rose supposed the TARDIS would give him a mirror eventually... and then he might notice the oil spray freckles, too.

* * *

They had tea and talked for awhile about subjects much safer than their flirting habits, which were decidedly bad. They talked small and simple instead, discussing the tests the Doctor had been running, the next place they would go when he was satisfied with the results, even why the tests had to be done here (something about a stable rift of some sort).

Rose gradually slid the little brown paper parcel out where she could pick it up again and toy with it, passing it nervously around in her hands while the Doctor dawdled over his shortbread biscuits. "I found something in that bookshop, and I wanted to get it for you." She stood and held the package behind her back. "I don't know what it is - except that it's a book, of course. I can't read it, but I know you can." Holding it out nervously in one hand, she watched the Doctor blink at the package as if it was bright pink and dancing the macarena.

The Doctor accepted the small parcel with his head tilted away and his eyes overly bright. With a reverent hand, he simply stroked the wrapped gift for a moment, his expression made inscrutable to Rose by a bowed head.

Sitting down again next to him, Rose folded herself up against his side. "Aren't you gonna open it?" she asked. She'd meant to tease, to bring him out of the mood he seemed to be drifting into. Her voice had come out soft and worried and childlike instead.

The Doctor sniffed and then nodded, jerking his head up to give her his brightest grin. "Been awhile since I had a present," he said with forced cheer. "Was tryin' to remember what to say."

"You open it," Rose instructed. "Then you say, 'Thank you, Rose'. If you hate it, you still lie an' tell me it's nice, 'cuz I tried really hard, and it'll be the thought that counts."

The grin widened. "All right, I'll give it a go. But we'll still have to find you good trainers - may come in handy in a crisis, them."

"I'm sure you'll like this better'n my shoes."

The Doctor gently slipped a finger under the flap of the parcel and began prying up the tape at the top. Rose told herself it was nervous anticipation that had her staring; she was not admiring his hands at all.

"Open it," she pleaded with scarcely veiled excitement. "It's a book, not Pandora's Box."

The Doctor chuckled. "You never know," he said and finally tore the paper off the top half of the book. His gaze dropped to the title embossed delicately on the richly colored cover. His thumb smoothed over the silver leaf and he gasped.

For a split second, Rose thought he was pleasantly surprised. His eyes seemed to shine right before he turned them away from her. Then, he started to shake, his head bent over the book in his lap, his eyes closed. Rose was hit with the possibility that she'd somehow found something horrible.

He made a small noise and Rose hoped desperately that she wasn't about to hear the pain she'd caused him. Then, that noise was followed by another, much louder.

Rose's mouth fell open. The Doctor was laughing.

He gave himself up completely to his amusement, his whole body racked by spasms of hilarity. When she tentatively reached to touch him, just to make sure he wasn't hysterical or insane (moreso than usual), he threw his head back, gasping for air, but didn't stop. One hand reached up to dash two small tears from his face, the other wrapping around her shoulders to tug her close to his side.

Rose couldn't decide whether to be scared or to laugh just as hard as he was doing. Confused, she let him bury his face in her shoulder. When she realized that the Last of the Time Lords was giggling on her, she just couldn't wait any longer. "But what_ is _it?"


	2. Chapter 2

Written for the Storm and Wolf ficathon over on Live Journal. My prompt was Prompt 13: Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans. I could NOT resist...

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**Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans**

_Chapter 2_

**When she realized that the Last of the Time Lords was giggling on her, she just had to know. "But what**_** is **_**it?"**

The Doctor gasped for air, struggling to regain his composure. Slowly, he drew away from her, eyes closed, and breathing as if he was concentrating on nothing else. Finally, the Doctor cleared his throat and said something in that chiming, musical, resonant language of his. Rose repeated it, being so very careful, looking to the Doctor for confirmation. He nodded, another bark of laughter escaping even as he tried to look serious over Rose's attempt at his language.

"All right, what's so damn funny?"

The Doctor closed his eyes, snickered quietly for a moment, and then sobered, at least enough to talk. "The title translates - best I can do - as 'Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans'."

"Rassilon was that posh, important so-and-so of yours, wasn't he?"

"You do listen to me," the Doctor observed, and a rather endearing expression that was decidedly worried crossed his face. "I'll hafta watch that."

"Right, but he wrote this book?"

"Nope, nothin' like it."

"So someone wrote this book 'bout somethin' he wrote, then?"

"Nope, s'not that, neither."

Exasperated, Rose tossed her hands up and a guess out. "Someone wrote a comedy about 'im, an' this's it?"

The Doctor beamed at her and tapped her nose. "No, but that's a bit closer, I s'pose." He stared at the cover, joy, wonder, and immense amusement all plain on his face. "Of all the things to survive," he mused so softly Rose assumed she wasn't meant to hear. He looked to Rose with an honest, warm, affectionate smile. (She would have said loving if anyone else had directed it at anyone else, but as it was them, she did not dare.) "Still, glad you found it, before someone else - especially before someone who knew what it is."

"I don't get it!" Rose exclaimed. "Is it an embarrassing expose or something?"

The Doctor shook his head, then shrugged. "S'a bit embarrassing, I s'pose, at least in the wrong hands. Take it you didn't open it?"

Rose had just been regretting that very fact. "No, just realized where it was from and set out to buy it for you." She frowned. "Is it something awful?" she wondered.

The Doctor snickered again. "Not really. Just..." He pulled the book out of its paper completely, then leaned back and put his feet up on the coffee table. (The TARDIS bleeped at him about this, but he ignored her, as he usually did. If he pushed it, she would relocate the table, but she wasn't, apparently, completely annoyed with him.) "Maybe when you were in school you had a book you wanted to read an' you didn't want your mum or your teachers to know what it was, so you put a different cover on it?"

"Yeah," Rose admitted, not going into detail. "So, this some sort of trashy pop novel disguised as important history or something?"

"Well, every one knew it wasn't really a treatise on anything." He shook his head. "Least, tha's how I remember it, but..." The Doctor shrugged and turned the book over in his hands, inspecting something about it rather carefully. "A talisman, by the loosest definition, is an inanimate object that induces feelings or behavior by its very presence. The book itself is a talisman, basically." He opened the cover, looking over several stylized circles on what looked to Rose to be the cover page. Another chuckle escaped. "It certainly could be called trashy," he finished and flipped a few pages to a picture.

Rose's first thought was that the full-color print was a beautifully rendered art piece. Looking more closely, however, she realized that it seemed quite realistic, more like something actually happening rather than something painted or copied. As she stared, utterly baffled and completely confused, she realized that the golden-haired couple in the picture was moving.

No, _moving_.

Even as the picture began to subtly change, Rose realized what she was looking at. "Oh my god!" she yelped. She snatched the book from the Doctor's lap and started flipping pages. On every single picture (every couple of pages) there was... "Oh my god, I bought a porno mag!!"

The Doctor laughed so hard, he nearly choked this time. Tears streamed down his face, which rapidly colored. When he finally got himself back under control, he was well and truly sprawled on the sofa, and he smiled up at her as if she were a particularly bright and glittering something. "S'a bit more than that, ya know," he explained and Rose honestly thought he was trying to make her feel better. "First came out when I was at the Academy, which makes it well old. Also, this is a first edition, which makes it special. Even without more recent developments."

Rose frowned. "How'd you know it's a first edition?"

The Doctor looked away from her and reached out to tap the book in her lap with a considering finger. Neither one of them had looked down at it since Rose had realized what it was, and he looked like he didn't dare, now. "Slightly psychic, this edition. Publisher was fined, an' every copy they got hold of was destroyed."

"Why?" Rose demanded, startled. She'd always had the idea that Time Lords were brilliant and adventurous, out exploring the galaxies and discovering things. Surely they weren't also buttoned-up, repressed, and stuffy?

"It bothered some people, I s'pose you could say."

"That's really odd, though, isn't it? I mean, ok, it's people having sex, but that can be tastefully done. I thought it was art at first."

The Doctor's expression was pensive and rueful, but he seemed to decide something after a moment. He flipped a couple pages, still without looking at it. "Look down at the page, Rose, an' don't think of anything but whatever the picture brings to mind."

Rose reluctantly did as he asked, not sure if she should be looking at something like this with him around, but not sure what to do to get out of it. The page the book was opened to was a wide angled view of an open field of vividly red grass. The ubiquitous blond couple was lying on a blanket in the very center of the picture. Well... he was lying on the blanket. She was on top and rode her partner with a slow, sensuous rhythm that Rose thought quite a bit more erotic than those videos she'd seen elsewhere.

Their movements left all but the most intimate details fully visible. Everything seemed fully realistic. There was a sheen of sweat to their skin, they were flushed and seemed to be shaking a bit. Rose guessed if there was sound, they'd have been groaning or gasping or both. She wondered if he would have a voice like the Doctor's, all dark and oddly Northern, wondered if that man's partner thought his voice would be enough to make her climax if he said her name in the right way at the right time.

She wondered if that strange woman loved that man like Rose loved the Doctor, wondered if making love with him like that was something the woman might have fantasized about. There was something truly beautiful about this picture, as Rose had mentioned before. They were erotic, not pornographic, despite her initial reaction. They were art. Whimsically and perversely, though, Rose found herself wondering if either of them was actually a blond.

Whatever governed the camera of the book apparently took her unspoken thought as a question and zoomed in on the easiest immediate answer which appeared to be no. The woman's dusky brown thatch was shiny and damp with her arousal, the curls mingling with the tiny jet ringlets of her partner every time their bodies pressed together.

Now, Rose found herself starting to get aroused, wondering if the Doctor had ringlets and if he'd make her so wet she'd drip her fluids all over both of them. (Experiments suggested yes, but she abruptly wanted to know very very badly.) She wondered if he'd like having her on top.

The view abruptly panned out again and the picture characters had changed. Rose found herself looking directly at the Doctor's profile. Her own familiar face smiled down into his, every line of her body a picture of ecstatic concentration.

Rose was completely at a loss, had no idea what to say, what to think, anything. She sat there, slack jawed, staring at the picture that was suddenly of the two of them, the Doctor and herself. She was almost unable to even look at it. All she could watch, really, was the strained look on his face.

"Well, I'm flattered," the Doctor observed. He sounded like his usual flippancy was more than a little forced.

Squeaking with surprise and no little horror, Rose flipped the pages quickly, hoping to get away from the picture and maybe he wouldn't know. Maybe he wouldn't realize that it was all she could think about some nights, that the nameless fantasy men from her hottest erotic dreams all had his face, all had his voice, all had his hands. "It... it makes sense," she tried to defend. "Time Lord book, Time Lord lover."

The Doctor chuckled. "You really do think fast under pressure, don't you?" he mused.

Rose ignored that. In fact, she was seriously considering making a run for it altogether when something occurred to her. "Are the words stories? Or..." She had no idea what else they could be actually, so she trailed off and gestured a hand for him to fill in the blank.

The Doctor smiled and looked down at the pictureless page. "Yeah, they are - well, they're more what you'd call erotica, I think. Dunno, never read a lot of it, me."

"Duh," said Rose, smirking and feeling more in her depth with a discussion she could understand and, more to the point, control.

"What's that s'posed ta mean?" the Doctor asked petulantly. His arms folded across his chest and he looked so sweetly silly like that...

Rose sighed and tried to breathe deeply and calmly. Now was not the time to be wanting him. Now was, in fact, the worst possible time, ever, for that. Then, to make the whole thing worse, she realized he wasn't just gonna let it go, was in fact waiting for an answer to the question. Rose felt like she was going to drown again, after all. "Just, men are more visual than women; that's a documented fact."

The Doctor smirked. "Doesn't apply across species," he suggested. "So ya need a better answer than that."

Rose glowered. "Well, just assume I didn't think of that," she said, petulantly. "Stupid ape, me, yeah?" He frowned down at her over that, looked like he was about to say something, possibly because she'd stolen his line. "Or assume I know for a fact you never have time to read so much as your mail."

"What d'ya figure I do here all night while you sleep, Rose Tyler? Believe it or not, the TARDIS doesn't let me tinker constantly."

"Well, I'd ask if this book was unique in your collection, but that's not really my business." There. Now maybe he'd stop having the upper hand and she could close the book, change the subject, and run away and hide.

The Doctor smirked at her. "True enough," he said. Looking down at the book, he grinned broadly. "Tha's my name," he said, pointing to one of the symbols on the page.

Damn. He'd got her three ways, now, and he knew it, two for curiosity and one for emotions. "Which one?" she asked.

The Doctor took her hand in his, held it gently and helped her trace her own finger over one of the symbols on the page. "This one," he murmured.

"It means 'Doctor'?" Rose found herself whispering.

The Doctor's voice was soft and strange, quiet and reverent as it rose and fell over the chiming notes as he traced them with his finger. It was quite the most sensual sound Rose had ever heard, dark and sweet and still all at once, putting Rose in mind of the starry, endless nights the Doctor had shown her, the beauty of deep, shining space.

By the time he was finished, she was gasping. "What'd you say?" she whispered breathlessly.

The Doctor smirked. His voice went silky and so sinful and Rose felt herself shaking and getting very wet indeed when he murmured, "Oh, it was filthy."

Rose drew closer to him, watching his mouth, unable to help herself. "Oh, good."

The Doctor leaned even closer, blue eyes hot and very dark and closely focused on her mouth. He had to kiss her, he absolutely had to do, it wasn't possible he was just going to tease her, not this time, he couldn't. Rose held her breath and waited.


	3. Chapter 3

Written for the Storm and Wolf ficathon over on Live Journal. My prompt was Prompt 13: Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans. As OV would have it - I'm a bad person... -grins wickedly- But I'm GOOD at it.

NOT a work safe, kid safe, or innocent mind safe chapter. **_PLEASE_** stop reading if you shouldn't be!

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**Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans**

_Chapter 3_

**The Doctor leaned even closer, blue eyes hot and very dark and closely focused on her mouth. He had to kiss her, he absolutely had to do, it wasn't possible he was just going to tease her, not this time, he couldn't. Rose held her breath and waited.**

Time seemed to run out on her and she squeaked in a gasp of air. The Doctor started away from her, looking like he'd done something absolutely terrible, which he hadn't, not yet. Damn. It. All.

Rose was afraid she was going to do something terrible if something didn't give and soon. She shoved _Rassilon's Treatise of Talismans_ into the Doctor's lap, preparing to bolt to her feet and make a run for it. Several pages flipped over in her hasty gesture and the Doctor frowned down at the new picture, his eyes completely baffled.

Once again, curiosity got the better of her, and Rose couldn't resist. "This doesn't look any different from anything I found under someone's mattress. Well, it's more tasteful..." She shrugged, couldn't explain how what she was looking at was registering as something completely different from random pornography. "Was this what your people... um... preferred?"

"Time Lords aren't… like this," the Doctor explained vaguely, looking anywhere but right at Rose.

"Sorry, I'm not buying it," Rose said with a laugh. "I mean..." She gestured at the book lying in the Doctor's lap. The woman in the picture laid back across a table top, the man, who was wearing intricate, brightly colored robes that he'd shoved aside without bothering to undress, was between her thighs. As they watched, the woman opened her legs wider and the man stuffed his cock inside her hard, a fiercely possessive expression forming on his face.

Rose gestured slightly as she repressed a snicker. "Well?"

"This is a pillow book," the Doctor explained sheepishly. "It's idealized to appeal to largely celibate male intellectuals."

"You mean you wouldn't act like this stuff? You'd rather think than do?" She was, Rose realized, more than a little bit evil for not letting him off the hook, really. But then, he hadn't let her off the hook when he could have done, preferring to tease her about what the psychic book had made of her accidental daydreams. He could just be teased for preferring a slightly psychic book to a slightly – all right, extremely – horny human.

The Doctor cleared his throat and shook his head. "Well, we weren't likely to focus on the sex act itself. That's what the stories're about – the other stuff. Most telepathic species have some mental aspect to love-making. Mind, they don't have to use it, and some of the stories are about _that_, but…" His eyes dropped to the book again and he trailed off.

Rose grinned and let him sit there, zoned out and focused on the depicted sex scene, every heartbeat he was gone handing her ammunition. She noticed that the robes had turned crimson as he watched the picture, but mostly just counted until she was sure he'd been staring for a full minute. "But they like to?" she asked.

"What?" said the Doctor, looking up at her, thoroughly confused.

Rose giggled. "Step out for a minute there, Doctor?"

"No," he exclaimed, indignantly. "No, I was wonderin' how they managed ta shoot this one. Location's a bit... rude."

"How rude?"

"Like if I'd had you on that table in Downing Street." Rose smirked and the Doctor's eyes widened, his ears going red at the tips. "I mean..."

Rose glanced down at the book and took it away from the Doctor. "I'm not a natural blonde," she observed.

"I know," said the Doctor.

"Imagination not so good?" she murmured. That was, after all, her lying sprawled on that table, now, being very thoroughly shagged - hard and fast - by him.

"Hum?" said the Doctor.

"This isn't my fantasy," she pointed out.

"I told you, the book's slightly psychic." The Doctor tilted his head and smiled at her, his expression wobbling between smug and embarrassed, both his ears and his cheeks tinged a charming pastel pink.

Maybe she should just… or how about… or maybe… Confusion owned her for a moment, and when it let her go, it left her with the memory that this was the most important person in her entire Universe. She couldn't just let impulse run this decision, no matter how it appealed.

She sighed, utterly defeated. "What do we do about this?" she asked. The usual, normal, them-like answer was "blame the book, laugh nervously about it, and pretend to forget we ever went this far." It hadn't ever gone this far, but every time their flirting went that step further, far enough to make one or the other of them just nervous enough, they did this. It was the alcohol, the situation, three a.m., the moons – all 35 of them. It was the air, or the water, or the way she did her hair. It was his new cologne, the red dress, the other person, the prison bars… The list and the excuses and the constraints were as endless as they were ridiculous, really.

"Dunno," the Doctor said, shrugging. "I mean, it's pretty obvious what I wanna do about it."

Rose risked a glance up at his face again, his enchanting blush and his star-struck smile. Her eyes trailed without her permission along his body and the Doctor seemed to be letting her look her fill. He undid the clasp of his belt slowly, never breaking eye-contact with her while he did. He let her see it quite clearly when he adjusted himself in his jeans, embarrassment no deterrent to the small sigh that sounded like relief when he found a more comfortable position for the rather eye-catching bulge straining against the denim.

Rose felt like the more comfortable position might be between her lips. She couldn't keep still, she wanted him so much and her clothes felt so wrong, and he would feel so right nailing her into this sofa. She almost didn't catch herself in time when she realized her hand had wandered up the front of her shirt.

Her whole face felt like it was burning. Her stomach felt like an entire migration of butterflies had taken a detour into it. Forcing herself to concentrate on something, anything, the stupid book took precedence again. "What… when the picture um… runs out? What does it do?"

"Starts again," the Doctor answered. He closed the book, tapped the cover in three separate places, then opened it again to the first scene he'd shown her, the one with the picnickers. The woman ran a hand up the man's chest. He sat and watched her while her fingers and then her lips touched him in several places. It wasn't until she kissed his lips that he acted, wasn't until she moved to help him out of his clothes that he helped her as well.

Frowning in concentration as some idea tried to prod at her – other than the idea of shoving the Doctor down like that and climbing on top of him – Rose turned the pages until she came to the next picture. This one was in some sort of lab or technical area. The woman approached the man, smiling and apparently teasing, her eyes dark and longing. Rose watched until the blonds became a blonde and a brunette, then turned the pages again.

An office or other work area showed this time. The woman just sort of tackled him and snogged the hell out of him. Flipping pages again showed a recognizable variant of a TARDIS console, though not anything like the Doctor's one. The woman moved like a predator in this one, stalking the unsuspecting Time Lord at work at the console and…

"Got it!" Rose yelped. The Doctor looked at her curiously, a hesitant grin teasing the corners of his lips just like she wanted to do with her tongue.

So she did. She leaned over, kissed his cheek gently, then let her tongue swipe the very corner of his mouth. She didn't go any farther though, just sat up and reached for the book.

"Wha?" said the Doctor as Rose closed the book and set it gently on the coffee table.

"You won't make a move on me?" Rose asked.

"Can't," the Doctor answered, and he sounded rather sad.

Rose grinned triumphantly and set the book on the coffee table. "Human women don't, normally, you know."

"Yeah," he agreed, utterly morose.

"I'm gonna though, if that's all right."

The Doctor smiled gently. "It'll change everything," he pointed out.

"Good thing, too," Rose said softly.

"Why's that?" the Doctor wondered, his voice even lower, his face somehow slightly closer.

"'Cuz it's hard wanting to shag the hell outta your best friend," Rose whispered across his lips.

"Not as hard as it's been for me," he breathed.

"You gotta point," Rose said and, before anyone could spit out any more obvious and daft puns, she kissed him hard on the mouth.

For just a second, it felt to Rose as if she was the only one involved in the kiss. Then, the Doctor's mouth moved and his lips parted. The kiss became fierce and aggressive and everything she had ever imagined it would be. "Oh god, want you," she groaned when they broke away. She got her hands tangled up in wool as she tried to wrestle his jumper off of him and he tried to pull her into his lap.

Rose couldn't resist the delightful friction of straddling the Doctor, rubbing herself rhythmically against him, heat already building to a fever pitch inside her. "Rose," he murmured. "Rose, I…" Whatever he said didn't translate, but Rose was reasonably certain she'd find the symbols that meant it in the book on the table.

"Doctor…" She'd once thought it would sound stupid calling a man 'Doctor' in bed, but they weren't in bed, it didn't look like they were going to get to bed, and she didn't know a name that suited him better after all, anyway. A fit of frustration made her jump up from his lap and start tugging at her own clothes. "I can't wait," she whimpered. "Need you, _now_!"

"Thought you'd never ask," he answered, standing quickly beside her. The jumper hit the floor. His boots got kicked off before Rose had managed to undo the tiny clasps of her bra, and her jeans were off just as the Doctor's hands dropped to the buttons of his. Rose, now comfortably naked, put her hands over his, but he didn't want to wait for her, just tugged open the fly and let the dark denim fall.

Rose stared at his cock, a hard outline tucked tight behind dark colored cotton. Her hand moved without her conscious permission, and she was rubbing at him through his pants before she quite knew what was going on.

The Doctor's hand covered hers, guiding her grip on him. His other hand reached for her, flickered over her dripping wet sex, one finger gliding unerringly to find her clit. Rose let her hand slip inside the Doctor's pants, felt him hardening just from her touch. She needed to see him, so used her free hand to shove his pants – the last thing barring their progress – out of her way.

The Doctor kicked their clothes roughly out of the way, but Rose could tell his entire attention was focused on her. His eyes were closed but fluttering, his lips were parted. She looked down the long, sinewy length of his body, delighting her eyes with the rangy beauty of him. He was as beautiful as his eyes, his smile, his voice. He was also every bit as impressive as he'd ever claimed to be. Rose smirked to herself. Possibly moreso.

Then, his ingenious fingers did something, found some pleasure center Rose hadn't even known she had, and she cried out for him, nearly driven to her knees under the rising tide of desire. She dragged ragged, reluctant breaths into her chest, the very air between them seeming to quiver with the fire burning inside her.

They moved in a rhythm like sex, mutual masturbation surprisingly easy to fall into after the way this particular adventure started. Rose tried to find embarrassment, modesty, even a little self-restraint, but there wasn't anything. She had her Doctor, the man she had loved and wanted for so long she almost believed it had always been like this. She was naked with him and before him, and it was completely natural.

The pressure between her thighs was building to explosive proportions. "No!" Rose exclaimed, and wriggled out of the Doctor's grip, gasping at the air, trying to calm herself a little. "Not yet," she pleaded, when he shot her a confused look. "Want you in me."

"Slower next time?" the Doctor offered, stilling his hips with effort and catching her hands.

Rose grinned, then nodded. "That'd be good," she said with a determined nod.

The Doctor lifted her, large hands securing the backs of her thighs like they'd been designed to hold her. His eyes were burning, and Rose just wanted him, please, now, inside her, please. She wasn't sure what of that she said aloud, but she knew very well some words escaped her while she clung to his shoulders and traced her tongue along his collarbone.

She could feel the broad tip of his cock at her wet little cunt, and she was aching, clenching, _dripping_ for him. "Please," she murmured, and tried to move so she could lower herself onto him. She couldn't remember ever having wanted anyone anywhere near this much.

"Rose," he groaned, "what about...?"

"Oh fuck, just, _now_ Doctor."

With a groan so deep it seemed to have been pulled up from the heart of the ship and channeled through him, the Doctor loosened his grip enough to lower Rose down onto him. It was pleasure so intense it was nearly painful, the feeling of him filling her up so fully, stretching her, touching her in places she'd never known she had. "God!" Rose yelped.

"You're so..." the Doctor murmured through tightly gritted teeth. He lifted her, then lowered her again, gasping for breath on each movement. "Beautiful."

Rose had her head bent back, her spine arched, trying to feel everything all at once. She could feel his cock stretching her, feel every single inch of him, every slide and quiver and twitch of him. Her taut nipples jutted a pebbled invitation for his mouth, his teeth, his tongue. Her clit was pulsing as their movements dragged it against his cock, her internal muscles were grasping, and the very deepest part of her, where he touched her in such a new and strange way, was tingling and sparking and almost but not quite hurting. Every single movement felt better than the last, but this way, just wrapped around him while he stood here in the middle of the room, it just wasn't enough anymore. She needed friction, leverage, something.

The Doctor seemed to catch on to that thought, because his hands readjusted, one reaching to support her weight entirely on its own - she tightened her legs around him to make that easier - one spreading out to sweep the clutter of papers from his desktop. Rose hoped there was nothing important on it, and then he was lowering her onto the desk - carefully, so that he didn't have to withdraw from her body. "Nothin' important," the Doctor muttered, and then his lips came down and closed on the begging peak of one of her nipples.

Rose's back arched as he nipped at her tender skin, and she cried out his name when he soothed the small hurt with a slow brush of a cool tongue. When he tilted his head to the other nipple, she squirmed hard because, while what he was doing felt amazing, he'd stopped moving to pay attention to her breasts.

"You're..." She broke off with a gasp as he withdrew and then thrust into her again, free to move now that the desk supported her. He rocked slowly, rhythmically, and Rose got the idea he was trying to prolong this indefinitely. "Fucking huge," she groaned as a tilt of her pelvis seemed to allow even more of him inside her. "God, so fucking good." This wasn't what she meant to say, but she kept getting distracted. It had been too damn long for her, and she had no idea how she was going to last even long enough to finish a coherent sentence.

"So close," the Doctor murmured, hands on her hips, pulling her to the very edge of the desk. His face was buried in her shoulder now, and Rose could feel him nip at her with his teeth every three or four times he plunged into her.

That was the question. "Are you reading my mind?"

"Want to," the Doctor answered shortly. "Not doing it now." He groaned and let go of her, shoving her down onto her back again, lifting her bum off the desk with one hand.

Rose mumbled a rather delirious series of curses that made the Doctor chuckle lightly. The sensation and strange movement made her groan and tighten her muscles on him deliberately. He groaned and swore in response to that, which made her chuckle at him this time. He shot her a stern, wicked, beautiful look and thrust hard into her, until she cried out. Then, he slowed his movements to a languorous rocking, her hips and his pelvis angled just right to burn her clit with his shaft with every movement.

"Why?" she asked, though she couldn't remember what she thought she wanted to know.

"Didn't say I could," he reminded her.

Oh, right. "Please," she whispered, not just for that but for everything.

"Next time," he answered, and moved hard, punctuating each thrust with a low, visceral cry. "Can't wait."

Good point, Rose thought. She was burning, warm and deep and building, and his motion was getting erratic and unsteady. "Coming, Doctor?" she murmured, smiling wickedly at the thought of holding that over his head.

"You first," he groaned. He lifted one of her legs onto his shoulder, the other hand falling down to torment her throbbing, quivering little clit. Rose jerked, tried to get away from him. He moved like fate inside her, hard and fast and unstoppable. It was too much, way too much, she couldn't, not like... god... this... "Doctor!!"

The orgasm didn't so much wash as tidal wave over her, and then it swamped her in blinding white light and sensation that was blazing and breathless, that didn't leave, that raced up and down her nerves, that owned her. She quivered in pleasure, gasped and shuddered and cried, and it just went on and on.

Him, always. Her Doctor. Forever.

"Rose, Rose, Rose..." His teeth clenched around the words, like he was trying to hold them back, as much as the rest of him. Rose came back to herself in time to watch him break, his control gone, his voice rising to an incoherent shout as he threw his head back. Rose had never seen him more beautiful, frozen in this moment, an expression of perfect ecstasy glorious on his face as he came hard inside her. The tableau held just like that for a second, and then he collapsed, shaking and muttering, dropping to his knees before her.

She was still spread before him when he looked up into her face, his eyes shining. Not breaking her gaze, he placed a gentle kiss on her opening and one on her clit that caused her hips to buck. He flashed her a lazy, sated grin before he reached for her. Rose was still shaking from the force of their joining when he cupped her hips in gentle hands, pulling her boneless form into his embrace. Blue eyes dancing, the Doctor relaxed and toppled over, Rose landing on top of him, where they sprawled, entangled on the thick rug.

* * *

"Cultural differences," the Doctor explained into Rose's sweat-damp but drying hair.

"Hum?" she murmured, distant and dazed.

"Just, you know, this," he said. His hand brushed over her skin as he gestured, nearly as Rose could tell with him curled up behind her, at the whole room.

"Yeah, I can tell," Rose said. "Human men tend to lose consciousness. You would talk instead."

"That ok?" the Doctor wondered. He sounded to Rose's long trained ears like he was genuinely worried and didn't want her to know.

"Course, it's fine," she said softly. "Better than. I wanna know everything about this and about us, and if you wanna talk about it right now, I'm just glad." She paused thoughtfully, then turned over to look him in the eye. "Is it always gonna be like this?"

The Doctor's eyes were over-bright again and laughing at the same time. "I'm just glad ta hear you're interested in trying it again."

Rose curled her leg up over his hip and wriggled closer, just to make sure she made her point. "I hope you are, too," she invited with a coy little smile. Her brow furrowed of its own accord when it suddenly occurred to her. "Do I haveta start things all the time?"

The Doctor's free hand cupped her shoulder while he propped himself up to look at her with the other. His eyes went distant and thoughtful. "I'd been wonderin' for months, you know. I sorta thought you might want me, but you never said."

"You never said neither," Rose pointed out. She looked across the room toward the book, then back up at the Doctor, smiling. "I'm glad I found that thing. I was starting to tell myself you were asexual or something."

The Doctor lowered his hand from her shoulder to her hip, tugging her lightly closer to him. She could clearly feel that he was already halfway hard again between them. "Not asexual, love," he said, his voice like dark chocolate sin.

Rose grinned as wickedly as she could manage. Judging by the Doctor's shiver, she did a decent job. "But why didn't you say?" she wondered, letting her fingers meander over the smooth planes of his spare, muscular chest. She could feel the doubled beat of his hearts and couldn't resist leaning forward to trail kisses between them. "This was never your first time, there's no way, you're too damn good."

The Doctor shook his head. "S'been a while, though." He tilted her chin up and kissed her again, more sweetly this time, tongue sweeping out to tease her lips. "I had to apply my rules to you. At first, it was just to keep you at arms length, remind myself I couldn't have you, because you wouldn't understand."

Rose waved a frustrated hand, then rested it on his sternum. "You have me," she said, firmly. "At the moment, it's on this floor and naked, but you have me all the time, however I need to be for you… for us."

The Doctor closed his eyes, an expression of fierce joy beginning to stir his eyes and his slowly building grin. When he looked at her again, his irises were indigo and his gaze was so intense that Rose felt like she was falling into it. "Us," he said, as if it was a truly beautiful word. "Rose."

"Yes, Doctor?"

"Stay with me?"

"Of course," she said, puzzled.

His brow crinkled in frustration. "No, I mean…"

Rose put a hand up over his lips. "Of course," she repeated, intent to make him hear her this time. "Of course you, of course me, of course us, and staying, and here and together." She peered deep and intent into his eyes. "OK?"

The Doctor's beaming face could have served as a star. "Of course," he agreed.

Rose let her fingers wander over his skin, smiling to herself, lost in thought. Forever with this man might not really be long enough, but it was going to have to be tried. He wasn't perfect by anyone's definition, but oh, the Doctor was perfect for Rose Tyler. She smiled and wriggled her hips, trying to get closer, enjoying the little sound that escaped him.

All at once, she was flat on her back, the Doctor above her. "Rose," he said. "We're together now?"

"Yes, Doctor."

"And you'll stay with me, right?"

She nodded and he nodded back, something fun and filthy building up behind his eyes.

"Then, if I'm yours and you're mine…" He smirked knowingly when she gasped and writhed in response to his shifting hips. "Then, I can initiate things."

The Doctor pushed slowly inside her. Rose, happier than she ever thought she would be, opened up for him, for them. Together, as they should be, they moved.


End file.
